National Front of Iran

The National Front is an outlawed centrist political party in Iran, founded on 12 November 1949 by Mohammad Mosaddegh. The National Front was founded as an umbrella organization of a vast array of left-of-center political forces, including supporters of nationalism, liberalism, secularism, social democracy, and socialism. In 1951, the party won control of the government, but it was overthrown by Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi with support from the United States and United Kingdom in 1953. The party would disintegrate during the 1950s and 1960s, with the Freedom Movement of Iran growing out of the National Front. The National Front then became a mostly-secular liberal party, and the party supported the 1978-1979 Iranian Revolution. However, the party was banned by the Islamic republic due to its opposition to the implementation of strict sharia law in the new theocracy, and it illegally operated under surveillance from the Iranian government.